


Staring Into Open Flame

by 1millionclouds



Category: Avatar: The Last Airbender
Genre: Assassination Attempt(s), Blood, Emotions, Gen, Trans Zuko (Avatar), Violence, aang cries, because he's always trans in anything i write regardless, being the fire lord is HARD, i cry, zuko cries
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-24
Updated: 2020-06-24
Packaged: 2021-03-04 05:14:01
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,880
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24888184
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/1millionclouds/pseuds/1millionclouds
Summary: Aang pays Fire Lord Zuko a visit, but so does...an assassin.  Neither of them make it out unscathed.  Together, they pick up the pieces.  A lot of holding each other and crying happens.  (Also, for a moment there Aang procures some nail polish and makes a feeble attempt to turn it into a normal sleep-over.)
Relationships: Aang & Zuko (Avatar)
Comments: 17
Kudos: 174





	Staring Into Open Flame

**Author's Note:**

> okay i did not WRITE this while drunk BUT. i am drunk right now as i post this. i cannpt get it formatted the way i want it. i might edit it tomorrow. i might not!!! but right now i am not reliable especially with editing BUT i am posting this regardless. fuc k you <3
> 
> i am only proud of this for its funnier moments and for nothing else because this is super indulgent bc i love aang and zuko's friendship and everyone else is allowed to have nice things but i am not because im evil. the end. 
> 
> partly inspired by the friendship i have with one of my best friends. i love n miss him..........
> 
> anyways, enjoy. i am indeed part of the crowd that saw all of avatar while it was still airing but rewatched it recently on netflix and subsequently fell in love with it all over again. i hope as a result you can read an enjoyable story. not that my story here is enjoyable! i just hope it is bc what more can i ask for here haha. 
> 
> ALSO YES i think zuko's story has soooooo much in common with a trans narrative so while it's not relevant to the story he's not cis here because i dont like writing cis ppl because i don't understand them and i don't think they make sense and im trans and so i say zuko is trans so he's trans. if this is a problem for u. stop interacting with me now. if this only makes you want to read this story/my writing more.....MWAH (that's me giving u a smooch)
> 
> hhhhhhhhhhhjweowghbwie75ghowcirhfwier67gfywchoe8f7wcty5945hfwieurhfyerf yEAH LETS DO THIS

Zuko’s eyes are suddenly open, and he is awake. The mattress under him is dipped under someone’s weight in four points: above each shoulder and beside each hip. There is also a face inches away from his own. 

Another assassination attempt, no problem. 

Zuko tenses, ready to spring into action, but flinches as his door is slammed open. 

It’s Aang. And he’s glowing like the sun. 

Zuko knows he shouldn’t stare, not because it’s rude, but because there is a man above him poised to take his life, and he really should be more focused on that. Aang says something but Zuko can barely make it out because he’s never been this close to Aang while he’s in the Avatar State and wow, that’s a lot of voices coming out of his mouth. He turns his attention back to the assassin in the nick of time, because a knife is coming down at his throat. He twists and surges upward, but the quarters are far to close and a gasp wrenches from his lungs as the knife lands itself in the meat of his shoulder. He feels all of it; the clean steel entering his flesh, the sharpened edge cutting through muscle, the very point of it pressing deeper and deeper. 

The shadow of the assassin is knocked out of his sight and is replaced with a blazing white just when Zuko is bracing himself to kick his assailant off of him. His eyes adjust and Aang is above him on the bed, standing strong and steady with a foot on either side of Zuko’s chest. He slowly steps off the bed, approaching the crumpled assassin against the wall. He opens his mouth, and this time Zuko understands him. 

“That was my  _ friend _ you just tried to kill.” 

Zuko sits up and feels the blade shift in his shoulder. He tries not to retch at the sensation. “Aang!” He calls out. He forces himself to his feet. He didn’t want Aang to bring this man to justice himself--he had no idea what the legal precedent was for the Avatar beating up the Fire Lord’s attempted assassin. 

Aang responds by forming a sphere of hurricane-speed winds around himself, which tear the room apart where it touches it as well as flings Zuko across the room into the opposite wall. He cushions his head with his hand just in time. 

Zuko sees Aang lift up the assassin by the neck and slowly drift himself clean through the wall. Zuko groans as he thinks about having to remodel. He presses a hand around the knife in his shoulder and struggles to stand. “Aang, I’m okay!” He hollers. “Stop shredding my bedroom!” 

Aang’s head turns ever so slightly in his direction. He drops the assassin, leaving him to fall two stories to the ground. Zuko squeezes his eyes shut once he sees the glow fading from Aang’s tattoos and leans against the wall, breathing hard. The winds fade, the last of them being a deep exhale from Aang. 

“Zuko!” Aang cries, and Zuko opens his eyes when he feels Aang press a hand against his uninjured shoulder. Aang’s eyes are wide, his stare fixed on the knife. 

Zuko follows his gaze. “If I pull it out, can you waterbend my blood back inside of me?”

“Zuko! You need a doctor! I am not a doctor!” 

Zuko nods. “Good talk.” And he clasps the knife in his fist. And yanks. 

Aang catches him as the knife clatters to the floor. Nausea rises high in Zuko’s gut at the feeling of the blade sliding free, but he holds himself together. Aang grunts under his weight, but Zuko gets his shuddering legs underneath him and straightens up, a forearm braced in Aang’s grasp. 

“Why would you do that!” Aang groans helplessly. 

Zuko’s vision is tunnelling. It focuses on the knife on the floor, its blood-darkened blade reflecting moonlight. “That’s a pretty nice knife,” he croaks. 

“Not the time, hotman!” 

His pulse raging in his ears, Zuko feels something dangerously bitter hit the back of his throat after all. He pushes Aang away in a panic. Aang yells in protest, but Zuko gulps and says, “Gonnabesick,” and Aang backs up immediately. 

Suddenly the floor is inches away from Zuko’s face, which is weird, he decides. But then he realizes he’s falling and hears his skull thwack against the hardwood. He’s out before he even feels the pain. 

When Zuko wakes up, he is assaulted by entirely too many feelings than he needs to be. He has a splitting headache in his right (only) eyebrow and he feels like he is floating except for two things. One, the heavy ache in his left shoulder. Two, the heavy weight on his other shoulder. 

He opens his eyes. It’s late morning; he’s slept in. Great. 

Even better, he solves the mystery of the weight on his right shoulder: Aang. His bald head is tucked neatly under Zuko’s jaw, his breath tickling his neck in a way that would be way too familiar if they hadn’t, like, saved the world together. 

“Aang,” Zuko says, voice hoarse with sleep. 

Aang shifts slightly. “You’re awake!” He responds softly. The arm he has across Zuko’s chest moves to trace zigzags over his ribs. Zuko closes his eyes again, relishing in the comfort of Aang’s touch. “I’m not hurting you, am I? I can get off.” 

“I feel good,” Zuko mumbles. 

“You got stabbed,” Aang informs him. “And you fell on your face! Next time you’re gonna pass out on me don’t tell me you’re gonna throw up. I could have caught you.” 

“What’s the difference?” Zuko says. 

“The difference,” Aang points out, “is that I run away from you for one, and run toward you for the other. Don’t mix them up!” 

“I’ll remember that next time.” Zuko yawns and turns his head so he can place his chin atop Aang’s head. His shoulder is starting to throb and he’s hoping he can fall back asleep before the pain becomes debilitating. 

“How did that assassin even get in?” 

Zuko grunts. 

He feels Aang frown against the base of his neck, but it’s too late. He’s drifting off, and Aang lets him. 

When Zuko wakes up next, it’s well into the afternoon, it’s because he has become aware of the deep pain in his shoulder and his body refuses to let him ignore it further. He seizes up, breath coming in gasps as he tries not to whine in discomfort. 

He’s in the guest room he had originally set up Aang in, and Aang is gone. He tries not to feel disappointed because he really, really does not want to be alone. He had recently started learning how to not only accept affection but to know when he’s wanting it, and he wishes Aang hadn’t left so soon. His forehead feels sticky with sweat and he would kill for a friend to come and tenderly brush his hair out of his eyes. 

There’s an ache deep in his gut and he just knows he’s dehydrated. He sits up in bed but the wound on his shoulder shifts uncomfortably, and he clenches his teeth as he slides his legs off of the bed. The change in position does nothing for the headache that’s picking up speed in the right side of his face, either. 

“This fucking sucks,” Zuko grits out to himself. He wishes he could, at the very least, sit up straight without hunching over. He tries. The motion feels like it peels the slice in his shoulder apart and he immediately curls in on himself, eyes wide.  _ No _ way he’s trying that again. He knows logically that it must be stitched shut, but for once he doesn’t want to take any chances. 

Looking down, Zuko notices a flash of color. His toenails—they’re painted, he realizes, befuddled. Dark red. There’s a blobby yellow shape on the right big toenail he assumes is supposed to be a flame. The other one sports a light blue arrow. 

Zuko narrows his eyes. Did...did Aang paint his toenails? While he was asleep? 

“Do you like it?” Aang says from beside him. 

“Huagh!” Zuko shouts in surprise, involuntarily flailing. 

“I’m sorry! I didn’t realize I snuck up on you!” Aang tries to still Zuko. “I was just getting you some water!” 

A full mug is thrust in front of Zuko’s face. His shock forgotten, he snatches it and pours it down his parched throat. The coolness of the water calms him down, makes what’s happening to him make a little more sense. 

“Thanks,” he rasps, handing the mug back to Aang, who places it on the bedside table. 

“Sorry for scaring you,” Aang says again, sitting on the bed beside Zuko. “You can take off the nail enamel if you want. I saw one of your body guards use some, and she let me have a few colors. You were sleeping a lot, I got bored.” 

Zuko wiggles his toes, considering. “I like it,” he decides. 

“Are we gonna talk about last night?” Aang asks. His directness makes Zuko’s stomach lurch with anxiety, but he knows he should have expected it. 

“Later?” Zuko groans. 

Aang smiles. “Yeah, okay. You look terrible.” 

Zuko scoffs. He feels terrible. 

A few minutes later, Zuko finds himself propped up on a mound of pillows with Aang perched at his feet, trying to make the flame on his big toenail look more like a flame. 

“You can’t just lay on the yellow,” Zuko gripes. 

“But it needs more!” 

“You gotta go back in with the red! Carve away the top of it so the yellow is more pointy.” 

“I’m the Avatar, I know what I’m doing!” Aang insists, but he caps the yellow paint regardless. Zuko tries to hand him the red, but Aang turns his nose up. “I have to let it dry,” he declares. 

“It’ll be fine,” Zuko presses. 

“No it won’t! You have to be patient,” Aang says with a smile that is way too innocent; Zuko is convinced he should at least have the decency to appear smug. 

He sets down the bottle and leans back into the pillows, sighing. Time to be patient, he figures. 

“Must be nice to have a day off,” Aang says. 

“All things considered,” Zuko finds himself smiling, “Yeah, it’s good to relax for a bit.” 

“I mean, you had to get attacked for it to happen, but you take what you can get, right?” 

Zuko nods, but Aang seemed suspiciously close to pushing the conversation about the last night that apparently needed to happen. Zuko can’t figure out why he’s so opposed to addressing it, but Aang, insightful as ever, seems to be aware of something Zuko isn’t. “I had cleared my schedule for the next few days in anticipation of you hanging around,” Zuko says carefully, “but maybe it is a good thing that I have a real reason to rest now.” 

Aang scrunches up his nose and looks sideways at him, displeased. “You didn’t before?”

Zuko thinks of the countless meetings, the assassination attempts, the uprisings, the sleepless nights, the weight of a nation on his shoulders. Of course he needs the rest regardless, but he can’t show weakness. “No,” he says. 

Aang crawls forward and bonks his fist on Zuko’s head. “You’re dumb,” he says. “You need rest when you’re tired, not rest just when you nearly die.” 

Zuko gently whacks Aang’s hand away. “Is this what you wanted to talk about? Me not taking care of myself? What makes you think I haven’t heard it all before?”

Aang sits back again, somber. “I think it goes deeper than that, Zuko. I think you’re stuck in some nasty self-sabotage. I think you’re seeing all the things you could do to make things easier for yourself and whether you realize it or not, you’re choosing to ignore the solutions.” 

Zuko’s temper flares, but he bites his tongue because Aang might be onto something, and even if he can’t stomach hearing it, he knows it’s worth listening whenever Aang is onto something. “I can’t station more guards around my quarters,” Zuko tries, “They’re needed by the servants’ quarters. And I can’t take more money out of the budget to hire more.” 

“Yes you can, though!” Aang insists. “You can’t just say no to a solution just because it requires some extra work! 

“Oh, so you’re saying I’m asking to be stabbed?”

“No, you’re not! But whether or not you're asking, there are people out there that want to kill you!” 

“So? I’ve fought them all off before!”

“Zuko, your country is relying on you! Your friends are relying on you! What would we do if you got yourself killed?” 

Zuko stops. Suddenly he understands. “I guess you would be pretty upset with me,” he mumbles. 

“Furious!” Aang declares. 

“Is that why you went into the Avatar State?” 

Aang pauses. 

“From what I’d gathered, I thought the days of you going into the Avatar State because of your emotions were behind you,” Zuko presses. 

“Okay, yeah.” Aang admits. “I was angry. I was angry at you for not taking responsibility for yourself, I was angry at the assassin for trying to hurt you, and I was angry at myself for not being able to protect you fast enough.” 

Zuko stares. Aang stares back. “I…” Zuko can’t even speak. He can’t believe how much he vastly overlooked how much he clearly meant to Aang, and he immediately felt the urge to comfort him, to make it up to him. “Come here,” he says, voice breaking. He struggles to push himself up from the pillows, winces when his shoulder jolts. Aang springs forward and guides him back down. There are tears in Aang’s eyes, and Zuko only realizes he’s crying himself when Aang reaches out and smudges a thumb against his damp cheek. “No,” Zuko whines, trying to pull Aang into him. 

Aang laughs wetly and allows himself to be coaxed down. “Zuko Cuddles. That’s special,” he notes, tucking his nose under Zuko’s chin the way he did when Zuko first woke up that morning. Zuko sighs, content, holding the Avatar as close to him as he can. 

“I’m sorry,” Zuko chokes out. “I’ll--I’ll do better.” 

Aang reaches around until he finds Zuko’s hand and clasps it tightly. “It’s okay,” Aang says. “I know you will.” 

“No, I put you through that,” Zuko protests. 

“And I forgive you.” Aang sniffs loudly, almost right in Zuko’s ear. He reaches up and brushes Zuko’s hair out of his eyes and Zuko’s heart damn near sings at the act of affection. “You’re my friend and I don’t want to lose you.” 

Zuko can’t hold back the sob that rises in his throat. “I don’t know what I’d do without you. I don’t even want to think about it.” 

Aang squeezes his hand; he feels Aang’s tears drip down his neck. “You don’t have to. I got you.” He wraps his arm around Zuko’s chest. 

Zuko sighs, trying to feel content. One of his dearest friends wrapped around him, he feels safer than he ever has as the Fire Lord. He knows there is work to be done, as always, not to mention what he missed while in bed. But right now, he relishes in the comfort Aang offers him, breathing in and out through his guilt and anxiety. 

“Can you stay here tonight?” Zuko asks tentatively. 

Aang must have sensed Zuko tensing because he moves his hand to rub small, calming circles over Zuko’s sternum. “I’ll stay as long as you need, hotman,” he says. 

“Stop calling me that,” Zuko says, automatically. 

“You like it,” Aang laughs. 

Tears well in Zuko’s eyes anew. “Yeah, maybe.” 

Aang laughs again, definitely noting the way Zuko’s voice tightened with his reply. “You big baby!” He pokes Zuko’s nose. 

“Shut up,” Zuko sobs. 

Aang takes a deep breath and sighs as he exhales. “You’re very warm, and this is a cozy time, but it’s nearing dinner time and you need to eat.”

“I need to stop crying first,” Zuko says, crying. 

Aang nods against Zuko’s chest. “Alright. Let’s calm down a bit first then.” 

Eventually, Zuko evens out his breathing, and when he stops squeezing Aang’s hand, Aang gets up and helps him out of bed. Zuko clenches his jaw as he pulls on a robe, but he has it on before Aang can reach out to assist him. After washing up to lessen the post-cry redness of their eyes, Zuko pulls Aang into another embrace. 

“Aang,” he says, “thank you.” 

Aang hugs him tightly, rubbing his back. Zuko wonders if he realizes just how comforting the extra touches are, how much he appreciates every second his hand lingers, because he melts a little, drooping over Aang. 

“Anything for you,” Aang whispers, and Zuko can hear the smile in his voice. Aang pulls back and holds Zuko at arm’s length, looking him over, happy with what he sees. “Now, let’s go get some food!” 

“Let’s do it!” Zuko agrees. “But I will  _ not _ race you.” 

“You’re too late!” Aang shouts, bolting from the room. It pulls a laugh from Zuko, and he follows at his own pace down the darkening corridor. 

**Author's Note:**

> HIIIII STILL DRUNK just thot u should know
> 
> emotions, right???? don't tell me you don't need to hold and be held by your best bro while crying. if you don't need that then why would you finish reading this. also the reason zuko reacts the way he does to pulling out the knife: when i got top surgery i had drains stuck in my chest for a week to keep the swelling down. i had to go to the doctor when it was time to pull them out, and i know from experience that when you're pulling a foreign object from your body, it can fuck you up. i stayed ok because i just talked through it and was able to stay calm but they literally brought me a barf bag and a ginger ale in case pulling out the drains made me sick. it's THE weirdest sensation ive ever felt. also i've been mildly stabbed before and they're VERY similar sensations. 
> 
> sorry if im abrasive rn im...........ugh idk im an angry person! ok ok ok ok ok ok ok ok 
> 
> i'd SAY i need a friend like aang IF i didn't already have one. but i DO have one he's just NOT AROUND and it PAINS ME
> 
> sober me might want criticism but drunk me will cry if you say anything mean so please leave the criticism to sober me thanks. i genuinely hope you like this tho because while i love creating chaos and standing atop my own self-made pile of rubble while laughing maniacally, i do aim to please. it's the daddy issues.


End file.
